


A Fistful O' Roses

by ukenceto



Category: Wolfenstein: The New Order
Genre: Heavy Themes, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Multi, but generally wolfenstein-typical stuff, to be added as the story goes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-16
Updated: 2018-02-11
Packaged: 2019-03-05 12:40:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,924
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13387992
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ukenceto/pseuds/ukenceto
Summary: A collection of vignettes centered around B.J. and Fergus, post their reunion in 'The New Order' timeline.





	1. The Bullet

**Author's Note:**

> I decided to replay 'The New Order' and thus refresh my memory before playing "The New Colossus" (still haven't yet though, so no spoilers for it in this work)
> 
> and naturally I got the equivalent of a ton of bricks hitting my feels (have I mentioned how much I love the heartbreaking details in that game? How about my love for B.J.? And Fergus? Well - now's the time for that) 
> 
> I needed to write something with them set in the time they spend in Kreisau Circle's HQ since I first played the game, but I didn't think I could do it right couple of years back. 
> 
> And considering how little fanworks there seem to be, I decided to give it a try! (jokes on me as I always seem to find niche ships and fandoms haha)
> 
> More chapters to follow, there should be some things from Fergus' POV too.

_"Well he never ever smiled_  
_But he always seemed pleased_  
_Said I'll never live down upon my bended knees_  
_said I see the game and the game - it sees me_  
_and we will dance until they bury me"_

* * *

 

 

***

 

Seeing Fergus again marked the moment in which, for the first time since he'd woken up in the Asylum, B.J. truly felt the world he was fighting for was his own again.

 

He'd been gone for too long. Fourteen years, no less.

 

Years through which the Nazi war machine had plowed through the heart of Europe, marred its soil with concrete and steel. Lands already ransacked with the memory of the war, now looked like nothing he could recognize.

 

Anya had been there, a solid presence to guide him back from the depths, to offer a way forth, to bring him direction. But he hadn't known her before, and while she was there during the brief lapses in his comatose, she belonged to this future, to his current self.

 

Fergus, well, with him they went way back.

 

***

 

Making his way through the Eisenwald prison had been yet another harsh reminder of what passed for reality now. As he'd disposed of the few guards in his way inside the facility, B.J. had wondered if there would really be any of his friends left to save once he reached his destination. Had any of them made it through fourteen years of rebellion and resistance?

 

He very much liked to believe that.

 

After all, his own life had extended way beyond what many would consider likely, the times he'd shaken hands with death and come through on the other side more than he could count.

 

He'd fought a long time, and B.J. hoped he would not be too late to find the one person who'd been in those battles as long as he had, who'd always had his back.

 

***

 

Still, he was not prepared to hear that familiar voice after he took off the chains, quickly rushing to remove the gruesome mask which trapped the man before him.

 

And there he stood, thinner and more scarred up than he remembered him, but defiant nonetheless.

 

Fergus Reid.

 

Staring into his face like he'd seen a ghost, and that alone was an expression B.J. had almost never seen him wear. Fergus had been through the grinder as often as he had, gone through the muddy battlefields streaked with the blood of their fallen brothers in arms, seen the worst of what the war did to men.

 

Yet it was in this very moment that his face was a mix of emotions, his words coming fast, accent heavy, not that Fergus was ever the one to hide it. But B.J. knew him well enough to read the undertone, to find the meaning in the narrowing gaps between the vowels.

 

"Here I was, getting ready for the eternal nap. And this Nazi killing jammy bastard shows up out of nowhere—" A deep breath, and Fergus steps closer, pausing for just a moment before bringing him in for an embrace. "—what've you been up to, Blazkowicz?"

 

Not quite a smile, but a turn at the corner of his lips. That one was easy, considering the short time he'd spend back in the land of the living since Fergus had seen him last.

 

"Shooting, stabbing, strangling Nazis." They parted, but his friend's grip on his shoulder didn't waver, a reaffirming touch B.J. was certain they both needed. "Ready to set things straight, Fergus."

 

"Well then—" the gravel in Fergus's voice was back, the tone B.J. knew from the days he'd been under his command, along with many others. "—let's square on outta here. Kill every damn Nazi that gets in our way."

 

***

  
  
And that they did, though by the time they were out of Eisenwald's walls, it was just him and Fergus again. The rest of the imprisoned resistance fighters hadn't made it through the merciless onslaught of the guards, and it was a close call for themselves with all the semi-sentient machinery that was out for blood.

 

Though Fergus mowing down Nazis with the rifle he'd picked up from one of the bodies along the way had truly been a sight for sore eyes; and it also served as yet another reminder that this was _their_ world, that it was just as worth fighting for as it had been before.

 

And Anya had been there, with a car waiting for them. Loyal. Trusting.

 

As they dived into the freezing waters, he could only feel grateful that someone like her and Fergus seemed willing to not let him walk this road alone.

 

***


	2. Brave new world

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sorry if the POV seems all over the place, I think I've gotten so immersed in the game, I write it as some omnipresent 3rd person + occasional first person from B.J.'s perspective. 
> 
> I've tried to separate the sections somehow, hope it's ok and it feels in character. 
> 
> This one is a bit slower and darker, but I dunno how else to go for it.

The resistance's headquarters still managed to turn out as a surprise, considering his lack of expectations.

 

The rather unique location (abandoned sewer system, really?) perhaps made possible by the flooding, which kept the machines and patrols at bay and also required the skill and dedication of those willing to pass through.

 

As Anya shivered in his arms, waiting for the door to open, B.J. wondered how much of it had been Fergus' idea. The man had always seemed to think one step ahead of the enemy, bracing for attack from any direction.

 

Must've been quite some, considering that right now he watched his friend being lifted up by a giant of a man who shouted excitedly, before letting the rest of them come in through the doorway.

 

Knowing that the Kreisau Circle was still there, that the people they'd lost in Eisenwald were not the only ones left standing was like finally sitting in front a fireplace after a long day.

 

Just one other familiar face for today though.

 

Caroline Becker. A woman made of steel. Another to have fought tooth and nail to make it through hell, to tell Death they're to meet a different day. It felt good, seeing her again. Another piece of resilience falling into place.

 

The rest, he came to know later.

 

Once he stopped seeing red, the man which every sense within him screamed to be an enemy, but others' logic disproved of that – Klaus. A story to be heard another time, maybe.

 

Max, the one who'd seemed both young and old, a soldier turned child by a gruesome injury. He'd seen others like him, in the past. In the trenches, shaking and shivering with fever and delirium, covered in blood and gunpowder; the newborn sons of artillery shells.

 

Tekla, the strange woman speaking of equations and probabilities, jittery, nervous - but even for a stranger it was obvious that her insults held no real malevolence. An answer he didn't have the right question for yet, it seemed.

 

Bobby, a man with distant eyes and even more detached words. In the past, they'd say a shadow has befallen someone like that; but who isn't plagued by darkness nowadays? He doesn't appear to have stopped fighting despite it: a strength to be honored.

 

 

***

 

 

Caroline keeps Anya busy - there are always things to be done, and never enough people to do them.

 

 

The rest of the place is not very big, but it looks empty now, with so few of us left.

 

 

I find Fergus in a room on the second floor, sitting on a chair, head in his hands. He seems exhausted, harrowed down as if all strength which had kept him upright so far has suddenly been drained.

 

Not the time for the words he needs to hear, neither those I wish to speak.

 

Still, he notices me standing in the doorway, but spares only a glance, groans as he stands and turns towards the bed.

 

 

"Bloody fuck, Blazko, I'm knackered."  Sounds like it for sure. "Haven't seen real bed in months. Fuck off for a bit so I can sleep, yeah?"

 

 

Three months, I've heard. The time he'd been in Eisenwald. I try not to think of what he'd endured in that time, of all he must've overcome so that I could find him fighting for each breath in that cell, of days and nights filled with torture.

 

 

"Wake me only, if the sky's about to fall, or some other such shite…"He stumbles face-down on the bare mattress, voice barely audible. "Fuck, just go away, would…you…"

 

 

I do. Never were the one to stay where I'm not invited. 'Least when it came to people. The dens of monster-men, well those cannot keep them from my fury. They do not get to leave war outside, and if even for a moment they believe so, the time would come when I'd be there for them. Blade ready. Waiting.

 

 

I close the door quietly. There's a sign above the room, a name. Fergus. So maybe someone here had hoped he would return after all. They kept out of his room, even if not away from his blankets.

 

I should find one, and get it to him. Some food, water. Time to see the rest of the place.

 

 

***

  
  
In many ways, the headquarters felt like he'd wandered into somebody's home. The mess of books, paintings, everyday objects scattered around and about; the kitchenette and the storage cabinets, the pieces of furniture and soft lights nested in the corners, it all spoke of a place where people lived from a long time.

 

And left only when necessary. There was training equipment, potted plants somehow still thriving underground, a soft music playing from a turntable he couldn't spot just yet.

 

He returned with a pitcher of water, a cheese sandwich he'd found in the refrigerator, and a blanked he picked from one armchair. Fergus was already asleep, but seemed restless, now and then a cough or a grunt interrupted his snoring. B.J. doubted he'd had the chance to sleep very deeply while in prison.

 

He left the food and water on the cabinet nearby before covering him with the blanket, taking a last look around the room before leaving.

 

There were empty bottles, cables and instruments scattered around and about, though the (probably empty) shell of an aerial bomb suspended with a chain from the ceiling had to be the most Fergus-esque thing he'd seen that wasn't the man himself.

 

 

***

 

 

He didn't look into the other rooms on that floor, wasn't able to just yet – not after seeing the names above few doors, crossed out with thick red lines.

 

It reminded him of blood, streaming down a stainless steel table.

 

Of an echoed scream, a gaze boring into him that he would not forget for as long as he was alive.

 

He'd never had to make that choice before, the monstrous, unimaginably cruel game Deathshead had played on him fourteen years ago. He never wondered what could've happened, had he looked the other way. But the regret would always be there, the regret that one man had to die, and that he got to say which one would live. It was different than the things done in the battlefield that nobody spoke of. Of silent mercy when death was the only release of the suffering of the flesh. Of holding a dying man's hand, alone, just so that others could pretend there had never been any different chance at all.

 

But the rest, that was not a burden made for mortals to carry. The full, conscious decision of it was terrifying in nature. Murder, by knife, or gun, or hand, when the enemy was just as able to be on the other side, it was war. Killing the innocent, the helpless, the trapped – that was extermination.

 

 

He wondered if the others had left those boards there as a yet another reminder of it. Of how terrible, and inhumane their nemesis was.

 

 

Looking at the mural which stood in the center of the floor, a hundred candles burning, bringing brightness to the pictures of people long gone, illuminating the names which had no grave to be etched into, gave him enough of an answer.

 

***


	3. Blood Brothers

_~_

_When you think that we've used all our chances_  
_And the chance to make everything right_  
 _Keep on making the same old mistakes_  
 _Makes untipping the balance so easy_  
 _When we're living our lives on the edge_  
 _Say a prayer on the book of the dead_

~

 

The dreams never went away.

 

 

In the weeks which came to pass, the memories of darkness and pain became less intense, as if his own mind was trying to protect itself. But whatever numbness alcohol brought during his waking hours, the nightmares stole easily.

 

They needn’t have details to recreate his adjacent horror and leave him waking with a desperate gasp for air, or tossing and turning, his body unable to find comfort neither on the worn out mattress or the hard floor. Always bracing for an attack, a tightly wound spring. Some more pressure though, and he was inevitably going to snap.

 

 

Another night had him lie awake restless, unable to focus enough to read or take something broken apart and make it work again. Instead, his thoughts flew like a squadron amidst stormy skies, anger and guilt and desperation threatening to overwhelm him.

 

B.J. was alive. Not only he’d thought he’d never see the man again, not until they met in the fields of the beyond, but he had saved him from reaching those sooner than not.

 

Nobody made it in Eisenwald for very long, and the only reason Fergus had survived those months was because of the information about the resistance tucked safely into his mind. Needless to say, the Nazi had proved to be very imaginative in the ways they’d tried to pry that information out of him.

 

He wasn’t new to the suffering of the flesh, and it was a bet with himself he’d made long ago, to never surrender, never give them what they want to know. Even if they tore his flesh apart, even if he never saw the light of day again.

 

He’d seen they had no mercy either way, seen too many die crushed beneath an iron boot.

And if his screams had echoed those of the other prisoners, his mind only recalled a different one.

One he owed to, one he kept thinking of whenever the weakness of his body had threatened to overwhelm him.

 

 

Even though the choice hadn’t been his, it was him who lived and breathed now, fourteen years later.

He’d kept doing the only thing he was ever good for.

He’d fought, flesh healing and broken bones mending time and time again. Tried to see hope where there was none, tried to see future where nothing but death remained.

 

And eventually, a ghost had come along to free him from the pain and the suffering.

 

 

Even if just for a little while.

 

 

***

 

 

Of all things he’d expected his future to hold, seeing that familiar face looking at him with concern had not been even a one in a million sort of chance.

 

Though if there was someone who have had fate’s favor nine times out of ten, it was the man who now stood before him.

 

Shackles broken and the dreadful mask which suffocated him tossed aside, he swayed on his feet for a moment, trying to will his numbered limbs back to equilibrium, eyes adjusting to focus in the harsh luminescent light.

 

For a moment, he’d thought he had finally stepped over on the other side, through the ever present grave in which his foot was firmly stuck in for years now. But alas, ghosts and visions were never this solid under his hold, and the afterlife was not supposed to hurt as much.

 

 

***

 

 

B.J.’s voice still ringing in his head along with the echoes of gunfire, Fergus scolded at himself for letting even those scarce bits of sentiment take root in him. Running a hand over his face, he sighed, frowning at the crumbling ceiling in his room. He wasn’t about to allow himself to think the way he had in the past.

 

 

What he was feeling was fury, it was the bitter resentment which had remained after all the anger and the denial had passed, after the harsh reality was all that he had left.

 

 

Maybe Blazkowicz could be the change they all needed, a force of nature in their last desperate frontier of defiance. But that didn’t change the burden Fergus had to wake to every single day of his existence, the knowledge that he was here, that he was spared by will when another had not. He could never put himself in William’s boots, to know why he’d made the decision he did. But as the days passed to weeks, he felt the invisible wall of things left unsaid between them start to crumble.

 

He was no longer able to avoid B.J. under the pretense of fatigue or of being busy; not when they made increasingly more desperate and dangerous plans, not when he couldn’t think of anything else but whether or not his friend was going to return from the next mission alive. There was tension unlike any other between them so far, an unstable state which could not last much longer.

 

Few things in life reminded him of it, and most of those tended to cause devastating explosions in the end.

 

 

There had been a way once, an unspoken truce which offered them a way to prevent pressure from reaching meltdown; but ever since he’s seen B.J. hold Anya’s shivering body close on their way back from the prison, he realized those old rules no longer applied.

 

 

Then B.J. went into Camp Belica, and everything changed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fergus POV! 
> 
> Also, if Iron Maiden existed during Wolfenstein's timeline, I can bet they were gonna be some of his fave groups. (all those war&hardship songs)

**Author's Note:**

> I'd love to hear anyone's thoughts so far! \xoxo


End file.
